Senior Pentagon leaders offered a sober assessment Thursday of the impact of automatic spending cuts on the military, arguing that they are embarrassing and unsafe for the United States while imploring a stymied Congress to stop them.

Fish and Wildlife Service Director Dan Ashe failed for more than a year to discipline two supervisors who retaliated against whistle-blowers at an Oklahoma field office, the Interior Department's inspector general says in a harshly worded letter that accuses Ashe of damaging the agency's credibility and integrity.